


There Are So Many Thoughts In My Head

by SereneCalamity



Series: Someone Worth Fighting For [4]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe, Anita the kitten, Bucky Barnes Feels, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Miscommunication, Protective Steve Rogers, Steve Rogers Feels, Wanda Maximoff & Peter Parker Friendship, damn straight
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-15
Updated: 2019-11-20
Packaged: 2020-09-01 05:34:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,538
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20252989
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SereneCalamity/pseuds/SereneCalamity
Summary: Steve and Bucky haven't had a chance to talk since the Stark event, and there was a lot for both of them to think about.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, guys, I'm so sorry about the delay in posting. My whole entire life was poured into this Harringrove oneshot that was meant to be 15k to begin with, and ended up blowing up to being over 35k, sooooo...That took over all my creative life for a while. Haha. But here's the update! And if you feel like checking out the story that took over my life, it's called I Found Love (Where It Wasn't Supposed To Be).  
As usual, not yet edited, so apologies in advance. And also, this wouldn't make any sense at all if you haven't read the previous installments.   
Disclaimer: I do not own the characters.

Five days had passed by, and there had been no word from Steve Rogers.

Absolutely nothing.

Or from Natasha Romanova, who had flown out with him, James 'Bucky' Barnes had found out the next day. Clint Barton said that he hadn't heard from Natasha either, but he wasn't sure if Clint was telling him the truth, or if he had just said that because he didn't know how Bucky was going to react.

Bucky had gone into the base every day, even though he technically wasn't required to, and he had to admit that most of the reason that he did that was because he was hoping to hear something about _Captain America_ floating around. He never did, and that honestly shouldn't surprise him, because he really hadn't heard much about Steve before then anyway, it was all sort of whispered things between people that he never spent time with. That wasn't to say that he couldn't find things out if he didn't want to, his time with HYDRA gave him a lot of skills when it came to computers and technology, but he just couldn't bring himself to hack into the SHIELD system to find out.

He didn't know what he was going to find out, and it was like Googling Steve, it had just felt _wrong_.

He wouldn't have cared about that if he had still been the Winter Soldier, but he wasn't anymore, he was Bucky again, and Steve was...Steve was _Steve_ and even though there was clearly something that he was hiding from Bucky, he couldn't bring himself to delve into Google and SHIELD files to find out what it was.

Part of him actually wondered if it even _was_ SHIELD sanctioned, because Natasha was gone and so was Sam Wilson—who Bucky hadn't noticed had disappeared at the party when Peggy Carter, Nick Fury and Maria Hill had come and collected Steve—but when he was walking down one of the hallways to go to his therapy's session, he heard Maria mentioning to one of her assistants that Natasha was on leave and couldn't be put forward for a surveillance mission. _Leave_, not on unavailable because she was on another mission.

Sharon Carter was gentle in his therapy session that day, and he wasn't stupid, he knew that it was because of Steve, and it made him a little angry, but honestly, he was just too tired to be angry.

"Where's Steve?" Bucky asked as he stood up to leave at the end of their hour, after pretty much just sitting there in silence. Sharon pursed her lips together and met his gaze steadily.

"I don't know," she replied. Bucky sighed and turned toward the door, because he should have known that she wasn't going to help him. Sharon knew all sorts of things about him, and he after he had started healing, he began to consider her a sort-of friend. But at the end of the day, she was his psychologist and she knew all sorts of things that she was never going to tell him because they _weren't_ friends. They were client and psychologist. "No, James," Sharon stepped forward, closing the gap between them a little. "I mean I don't know. I honestly don't know." Her voice was sincere enough, and Bucky believed that she didn't know the _exact position_ of Steve_ at this exact moment_ but she definitely knew something that she wasn't letting on.

"Right," Bucky said shortly, closing the door a little louder than necessary behind him as he left. He ignored the people who passed him by in the hall, and then the STRIKE officer who was standing in the elevator with him, which was fine, because most people ignored him anyway. When he got to the basement and started walking over to where his motorbike was parked, he realized that his breathing was coming out a bit quicker than it usually was.

A bit like it used to do, when he had first come out of HYDRA and started healing, and got anxiety attacks. They didn't happen as often anymore, and he didn't carry around the pills that he had been prescribed—they were somewhere in his apartment—but he refused to take them most of the time anyway. The garage was mostly empty of people, there were only a few other people on the far side, and so Bucky found himself a quiet corner and pressed his back against the wall, sliding down until he was sitting on the concrete floor and pushed the palms of his hands against his forehead, trying to calm his breathing.

It worked, and he felt his heart beat slow down, but his chest didn't feel as tight, and it didn't feel as though his skin was hot and prickling all over.

When Bucky lifted his eyes, Wanda Maximoff and Peter Parker were standing in front of him, a few feet away, looking tentative but concerned. Bucky stared at them, and he really didn't have the energy to glare, especially when Wanda knelt down next to him and rested a hand on his knee, gentle and light, and little red whisps of light surrounded her fingers. Bucky sort of understood what her powers were, although not really, and he still felt a bit hesitant when he saw the red magic floating around her.

"Did you want to talk?" She asked softly. Bucky made a move to shake his head, because he had literally just been trapped in a room with Sharon where he was _meant_ to be talking, but then he didn't shake his head, because it felt different. "I was going to the bar, to get things ready to open up tonight. Peter is going to help. Did you want to come?" Bucky found himself nodding and Peter came over as well, and held out a hand to Bucky, and Bucky took it and was pulled to his feet, Peter actually doing a lot of the pulling—sometimes Bucky forgot how strong Peter was, given he was slim and shorter than Bucky. But he had his spider-powers, or whatever they were, and he was reminded of how strong Peter was when he pulled Bucky's muscular figure to his feet without a sign of strain on his face. "You can follow us there on your bike," Wanda said with a small smile as she stepped back and Peter looked hesitant to leave Bucky, as though he was worried about him, but then he stepped back and turned to follow after Wanda.

Bucky found himself walking to his motorbike and driving it out onto the winding road that lead out of the garage, waiting for Wanda and Peter to come out. They did a minute later, in a car that Bucky had seen parked down the side alley of the bar quite a few times, Peter in the passenger seat and Wanda driving, and they both looked over at him as she slowly drove past. Then she accelerated and Bucky tightened his fingers around the grip of the handles as he followed after them.

They drove a lot slower than he was used to, but that was okay, and even though Bucky knew where they were going—somewhere that he had gone a hundred times before—he didn't overtake them to get there first. When they got there, Wanda parked her car down the side alley and Bucky parked across the street, and he couldn't help but feel a twinge in his side as he looked up at the bar and he knew that Steve wasn't going to be there. He shoved his hands into his pockets, lips pursed firmly together as he walked across the road and waited as Wanda unlocked the side door.

At least _someone_ was keeping the place locked.

"Did you want something to eat, Mr Barnes?" Peter asked as they walked inside and Wanda walked around, flicking on the lights. She started behind the counter, and then began walking around bar and then went to the stairs that lead up to Steve's apartment. Bucky watched her go, maybe looking a little longingly, and Peter shifted from foot-to-foot as he waited for Bucky to look back at him.

"Sorry," Bucky muttered. "What?"

"Did you want something to eat?" Peter repeated. "I can make you something?" Peter looked so hopeful and eager to please, and Bucky couldn't help but feel his shoulders relax just a little.

He was a good kid.

And he didn't get the tight look at the corners of his eyes anymore, like he was scared of Bucky, which made the older man feel better, and so he moved around to the other side of the bar and sat down on one of the bar stools, resting his elbows on the bar and looking across at Peter.

"What can you make?" Bucky asked, forcing himself to lighten his voice and Peter smiled widely over at him, obviously noticing the effort that Bucky was making. And it made Bucky feel good, because he hadn't felt..._Cared for_ since the beginning of the evening with Steve at Tony's gala.

"I can give anything on the menu a try," Peter announced. "_However_—it would probably healthy for all parties involved for me to just stick with something deep fried or a burger? I'm sure I can manage to find everything for that and slap it together in the kitchen." The corners of Bucky's lips twitched and he dipped his head in a short nod before lifting his eyes to look up at the black boards behind the counter.

"Gimmie a chicken works burger," Bucky decided and Peter nodded, disappearing into the kitchen behind the bar. The light flicked on and then there was some banging around, Bucky was guessing Peter was fumbling his way around the kitchen, and then Wanda was coming back down the stairs and Bucky watched her out of the corner of his eye. She moved easily, as though she was aware that he was looking at her but she didn't care, and then she was behind the counter, across from him, and she turned on the tap over the sink and washed her hands. "Anything I can help with?" Bucky asked, even though he had no idea what to do around the bar. He hadn't even come in early to help Steve set the place up, if he was here when the bar was closed, he and Steve were up in Steve's apartment, _definitely_ not working.

"No, I have this," Wanda told him with a small smile, the gentle lilt of an accent to her voice. Bucky nodded and chewed down on his bottom lip. Wanda turned off the tap and wiped her hands down, and was then starting to line up some glasses under the bar, easily accessible once the bar started getting busy. "Is there anything that I can help with?" Wanda asked him, and Bucky was surprised that she was getting right to it.

"Uh...I don't think so," he replied, looking down at the bar. "I'm just...Confused about some stuff." Wanda hummed under her breath and Bucky swallowed hard.

He just wanted Steve to be _here_.

So that he could talk to him.

The longer that he wasn't here, and the more that Bucky thought about, the more he realized that there was a lot that they didn't know about each other. Obviously he had found that out when he had discovered that Steve was _Captain America_, but there were a lot of other things as well. Neither of them had really talked about their families, and their time serving in the army, and things that they had lost, and Bucky had been completely okay with that, because he _never_ wanted to talk about those things, and he was forced to do that in therapy sessions, and that was more than enough. And so Bucky hadn't opened up, and in turn, Steve hadn't opened up to him, and there was so much that was left unsaid.

That needed to be said.

"Do you know where he is?" Bucky couldn't stop himself from blurting out. Wanda blinked in surprise at him, although he had a feeling that that was more to do with how loud his tone came out and he swallowed hard, trying to calm himself down. It was times like these that he really wished that he was the person that he was before he had joined the army, before he had been captured by HYDRA, before he was the Winter Soldier, just before. He thought about that a lot in general, but times like this it was _especially_ so. Times when he actually _wanted_ to communicate with other human beings were the worst times—like his Steve, or Natasha, or his sister... "Steve," Bucky kept his voice at a more respectable volume this time. "Do you know where he is?"

"No," Wanda shook her head and Bucky felt his stomach plummet in disappointment. He didn't think Wanda was lying to him, or just artfully avoiding the truth in the way that he knew Sharon was, but he had still been hoping for _something_ from her. "He never tells me where he's going when he gets this information," Wanda continued with a shrug, moving to one of the fridges and taking out a couples of lemons and apples, putting them on the bench and then pulling out a sharp looking knife from under the counter. "He tells me that he is heading out and to watch the bar, and that he will be back when he is back," she shrugged again and then slid a heavy wooden chopping out from somewhere and laid it down on the bench.

"So...You know what he's doing then?" Bucky asked, eyebrows pulling together as he tried to make sense of what Wanda had told him. She hadn't told him _much_ but it was still more than what he had gotten from Clint or Sharon.

"You don't?" Wanda looked genuinely confused as she looked back up at Bucky and Bucky's lips fish-mouthed a few times before just shaking his head. "He said he was going to talk to you about it..." Wanda mused and Bucky blinked rapidly. "He's going after HYDRA, Bucky," she told him, voice gentle and Bucky couldn't stop the harsh intake of breath.

"HYDRA? He...He found them?" Bucky breathed. "I...I didn't even know that he was _looking_ for them."

"He's never stopped," Wanda told him. She had lined up the lemons on the chopping board, and the knife was lifted above the board, red flickers around it. "He's been hunting them for years. Longer than I've known him." From what Bucky understood, Wanda had known Steve a long time. Not as long as Tony Stark and Natasha had known Steve, but longer than Sam Wilson. "I...I thought you guys would have talked about all of this. I didn't know that this was all a secret from you," Wanda looked hesitant, and Bucky was starting to understand that.

He didn't know what he had been expecting, but it hadn't been _that_.

Mainly, Bucky just wanted to know where Steve was.

He knew how to get past JARVIS, or maybe JARVIS just let him get past the security protocols, and he could get a quinjet out of the hanger and headed toward Steve as soon as he had a location, and then he would be able to get everything he needed directly from him.

But he hadn't been expecting this other stuff.

"We never talked about HYDRA," Bucky admittedly softly, looking down at the wooden bar top and running his finger absently down a long scratch. "We never talked about any of the stuff that happened to me."

"Even though he's the one who found you?" Peter was asking from the doorway with a plate and a burger and Bucky's mouth felt dry.

"What?" He croaked. Peter put the plate down on the counter top and gave Bucky a confused look that was maybe also partly adorable but also a lot frustrating right now.

"He's the one who found you? And got you out? I thought that's why you and Steve, like, had a thing. And why you used to stare at him so much in the bar before you guys started dating...Or whatever old people do," Peter shrugged, and Bucky frowned at him, a bit caught off guard and distracted from the main subject for a moment. He kind of missed when Peter had been nervous around him and watched what he said, because just blurting _this_ out—he hadn't expected that at all.

"He—" Bucky cut himself off, forcing himself to take in a deep breath and think for a moment, something that all the therapists and psychologists and mediation apps on his phone recommended doing when he felt as though he was getting in over his head. "He what?"

"Peter," Wanda's voice came out a little warningly.

"He—what? You didn't know?" Peter resembled a confused puppy, the way he tipped his head to the side and his chocolate brown curls tumbled across his forehead. "I just thought that was why you guys were so close, like...Some unspoken thing between you guys."

"Peter," Wanda repeated, and maybe it was because she could see how overwhelmed Bucky looked. Or that she could hear how fast his breath was coming out, harsh breaths being sucked between his teeth and then pushed back out. Peter seemed to finally take the hint and he stopped talking, putting down the burger in front of Bucky and then standing at his side for a moment, before resting his fingers gently on Bucky's arm.

"I'm sorry," he murmured, the kid sounding genuine and pained, as though it hurt _him_ to see Bucky hurt. But Bucky couldn't dwell on that right now, or even the fact that he should be _happy_ that he finally had an idea of where Steve was—or at least, _what_ he was doing.

"I need to go," Bucky managed to say, pushing away from the counter and sliding off the bar stool. His legs felt shaky underneath him, and his stomach was twisting in a way that it hadn't in a long time—in a way that it used to a lot in the months that followed after he had been rescued and memories of what he had done as the Winter Soldier had been flooding back and he had realized all of the things that he had done. He had spent a lot of time in therapy, and then the rest of his time wrapped around a toilet bowl and emptying the contents of his stomach, and then once that was done, going even further, the vomit turning black.

"Maybe you shouldn't drive right now," Wanda tried to say. "You could just stay in Steve's apartment? The windows are all open, I make sure to keep the place aired out while he's away."

"No, I need to go," Bucky repeated and Peter took a step back, to get out of his way as he headed toward the door, even though his legs still didn't feel steady underneath him and the tips of his fingers felt numb. "I need to go..." he wasn't sure what it was about the fact that Steve had seen him when he was at his worst, when he was trapped in a cage at HYDRA, shortly out of cryo, shivering and shaking as his body tried to focus on _anything_ other than the man that he had just attacked in confusion when they had been herding him into the cage, blood on his hands and smeared on his bare chest.

He could barely remember it, and he was pretty sure the only reason that he _could_, is because it was something that had happened so many times before.

Being rescued though—the HYDRA base being stormed with officer who weren't there to _hurt_ him—that was all new.

_Steve_ being there.

_Steve_ saving him.

"Mr Barnes?" Peter asked quietly, but his voice sounded far away.

Bucky slammed the door open and practically sprinted to his bike.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so sorry about this delay! Okay! Here we go! And, of course, this isn't edited yet.
> 
> I also wanted to let you know I'm about 30k words deep in another Stucky fic, heavy on the hurt/comfort, friends to lovers, University AU, that'll just be a long oneshot when I'm finally finished with it! I'll probably post a teaser of it up on my tumblr at some point, if any of you guys are interested.

Steve sighed as he rubbed a hand over his face, his body feeling tense and achy all over. Natasha was sitting opposite him with her legs spread out in from of her and her eyes shut, although Steve knew that there was no way that she was sleeping, even though they were all tired and in desperate need of a good nights rest. Or a couple of nights rest, really, given they had pretty much been working since they had left Tony's event five days ago.

He hadn't actually realized that it had been five days until they had boarded the quinjet and he'd checked in with Peggy, and he felt a stab of guilt in his stomach that he had run out on Bucky and completely dropped off the face of the earth.

Especially after Bucky had made a casual comment about how they had met in a bar.

Steve hadn't known what to say, and his brain had completely short circuited as he had swayed in Bucky's arms, and then Maria, Peggy and Fury had descended and he had been swept away.

If he hadn't been going after HYDRA, if it had been anything else, he would have put it off and focused on Bucky. But HYDRA had been something that he had been chasing after for years, it had been one of the only reasons that he had agreed to this mantle of Captain America when all he had ever wanted to be was a soldier, and honestly, for so many years it had been the only thing that had managed to keep him focused. He didn't pursue them with as much vigor as he once had and he didn't pour _all_ of his effort into it anymore—taking a step back from SHIELD and opening the bar had probably been the healthiest option he'd ever made in his adult life. But HYDRA were still alive, always working behind the scenes, and Fury didn't trust anyone else but those closest to him to go after them, and Steve had always been his first option to send in, and he'd always accepted it.

But he shouldn't have run out on Bucky.

For the first time, he should have said no to Fury.

Or, maybe not for the first time _should_ he have said no, because there were a lot of questionable things that he had done for Fury over the years, for Fury and Tony and before then, for the army, but for the first time he really, really wished he had.

Especially when he had turned on his phone for the first time in five days once they were flying out of Norway and all the usual messages came in—there were always ones from Tony and Sam, checking in, and from some of his other close friends—but the most important ones seemed to be the very recent messages, which were from both Wanda and Peter.

And they were about Bucky.

Wanda was worried that her and Peter had overstepped, because she had assumed that he knew what Steve was up to, and then Peter had also—naturally, and just like Steve had right up until a few days ago—assumed that Bucky had known that he and Steve had met for the first time in a half blown-down building, a HYDRA base, and had just let it all spill out on a very unsuspecting Bucky.

"Fuck," Steve hissed through gritted teeth, and Natasha's eye flickered open straight, laser-focused despite how tired they both were.

"What?" She asked bluntly. "Are we going back?"

"No, uh," Steve scratched his nails over his scalp. "No...It's just—" he flicked off a text to Wanda, since she seemed the most worried, and then he decided to text Peter as well, because he was a good kid, and he would never have meant for anything bad to happen, but now he was at a complete loss at what to do. When he looked back up, Natasha was looking at him expectantly, and she no longer had her legs splayed out casually in front of her, elbows now resting on her knees and eyebrows pulled together. "Bucky," Steve answered.

"I thought you guys were good? You were literally all twined around each other at the party before we left?" Natasha wrinkled up her nose. "I mean, good on you for going public and shit, but you know that means there's going to be a whole lot of questions about him now. It's bullshit, really."

"No, it's—did you know that Bucky didn't know we had met before he came into my bar?" Steve asked. Natasha stared at him for a few beats, pursing her lips together and then exhaled heavily through her nose.

"I didn't _know_ that, not for certain," Natasha said slowly, clearly picking her words carefully. "But I had gotten the _feeling_ that maybe he didn't remember you." Steve's eyes widened.

"And you didn't think to tell me?"

"I honestly thought that it would have come up between you two already," she shrugged a shoulder. "I mean..." she trailed off and huffed out another sigh, and Steve kept quiet, letting her take her time, even though he wanted to say something, because Natasha wasn't all that big on talking in the first place, and he didn't want to push his luck. "He always looked at you at the bar, and he was always awkward talking with you and all that shit," she shrugged a shoulder. "And I thought he _did_ remember you, just like you did, and that he was gathering the courage to say thank you or something. And that maybe he had a thing for you. And obviously you had a thing for him, anyone could see _that_, Rogers, and so then when you guys both started talking and shit, then we were all for that. It's just—" she pursed her lips and shrugged. "I don't know, as time went on I just started wondering if he _did_ remember, or if he really did just start having a thing for you in the bar." Natasha pursed her lips together and shrugged, and she _did_ actually looked apologetic, which was a bit of a surprising expression on her. "You guys just seem to have gotten serious and it's been a while, so I thought that you guys would have talked."

Steve didn't know what to say.

The only thing that had gotten him through the past couple of days and kept him focused was the fact that this was _HYDRA_. If he had been sent on any other mission, he would be getting distracted and his brain would have kept flitting back to Bucky and he would have been completely useless.

But now...

"Just talk to him," Natasha said quietly and Steve's head lifted to look at her. "I mean, I know it's shit," her jaw tightened and he imagined she was clenching her teeth together. "But me and Clint—we've been through a lot. We've both got a past and we've both had a lot that we've needed to deal with over the years, apart and together. So—it's hard, but...You need to talk to him."

* * *

There was no proper debriefing when it came to HYDRA, because the missions that they went on weren't actually sanctioned ones from SHIELD. Technically, Fury was the director and he had say over what they did and didn't do, but he still reported back to the board and he didn't want any of them knowing what they did, so anything that was HYDRA related was all kept quiet and among a closed group. Steve was relieved, because he had taken a hasty shower on the tiny on-board shower on the quinjet and then changed into a pair of jeans and a henley, and as soon as they landed, he was walking toward the garage where all the cars and vehicles were. It was taking a lot to stop himself from running, but he pulled out his phone and tried to ring Bucky, and he didn't want to sound out of breath and worry him.

Except Bucky didn't answer.

It was just after nine o'clock, which wasn't that late, but Bucky had been sleeping a bit better recently, so Steve tried to tell himself that Bucky could just be sleeping.

But that Bucky never slept with his phone on silent, and even though he had been sleeping better, he still wasn't a _heavy_ sleeper, than was something that came with being a soldier and also just with what he had been through with HYDRA that meant he was always alert, even when his mind and body should be switched off.

Steve swallowed hard as he pulled his phone away from his ear, considering it for a moment before tapping his thumb over Bucky's contact again and letting it ring as he pushed open the door to the main garage, stalking toward his bike that was parked near the front.

Bucky still didn't answer.

Steve's stomach clenched as a sick feeling rolled over him.

Part of him wanted to call Wanda and demand a word-by-word playback of what was said to Bucky and what Bucky had replied with, but that probably wouldn't help.

Natasha was right.

He needed to talk to Bucky.

Natasha was also right when she had said that she had thought that they would have talked about it in the past. Steve had actually thought about bringing things up before—not just things about their joint past, but about him being Captain America and what he had specifically dealt with in relation to HYDRA as well, to try and open up with Bucky and let him know that he wasn't alone. Things had come up before, with both of them, about what they had faced in they had been in the army, but they had all been brief and then the conversation had quickly been changed, generally by Bucky. Steve knew a lot of the things that Bucky had been through, he'd been full debriefed by Maria when they had first returned from the recon mission that had switched up to a rescue mission once Bucky had been found, and he had heard about a lot of the things that had happened. It made him feel sick and he had felt horrible, but he was a stranger to Bucky at this stage, he was just the guy who had found Bucky and pulled him out, so he had kept his distance.

And then when they started getting closer, in these past few months, Bucky seemed to be doing better, and for the first time in a long time, Steve actually felt as though he was building something _with_ Bucky. It felt good and he _knew_ that they were going to have to talk, he knew that they were going to have to share their pain and their pasts, but he just wanted to enjoy what they had for a little longer, and he had thought that they were on the same page. He had thought that Bucky knew who he was, that he had been the one to find him, but that he just wanted to take their relationship one day at a time, and not bring too much of their baggage into it just yet. Steve was ready for it, but Bucky's wounds were a lot more fresh, and so he wanted to take it at Bucky's pace.

Steve barely remembered to put on his helmet before he was tearing out of the garage on his bike.

His fingers were clenched so hard around the handles of his bike that his knuckles were bloodless, and his body was so tense that he could feel aches in his shoulders and thighs, even with the serum that pulsed through his veins and healed his body so quickly.

He definitely broke some road laws getting to Bucky's apartment, but for once, he didn't care. He would let SHIELD take care of any tickets that came through.

By the time he got to Bucky's, his heart was hammering in his chest and he didn't feel any calmer than he had fifty minutes ago when he had left the base. It was late, and so parking wasn't as chaotic as it could get, and parking a motorbike was something he had perfected over time, so he slid into a spot just in front of a silver Mercedes and then jogged toward the concrete steps going to Bucky's apartment. He had a key to the building and used it to get in, taking the indoor staircase two steps at a time before coming to a stop in front of the front door.

Steve let out a heavy breath, tugging his fingers through his messy hair, that felt a bit greasy as well since it hadn't properly been washed in days now, and he looked up at the tiny pinpoint camera that Bucky had set up near the top of the door frame as he lifted a hand to knock.

There was silence for a long, stretching minute and Steve glanced over his shoulder to the apartment opposite Bucky's, hoping that they were deep sleepers, before he knocked again, this time louder. Maybe if it was someone else standing there, they wouldn't have been able to hear the slight press of footsteps on the wooden floor inside, but Steve heard them and then he heard a light meow.

Anita.

Steve heard the footsteps come right up to the door, and he knew the only thing separating him and Bucky were a few inches of wood and he looked back up at the camera, knowing that Bucky would be looking back at him through the screens on the other side. He didn't knock again, just waiting for Bucky to make up his mind, and finally he heard the locks on the other side of the door beginning to unlatch. Steve's breath caught in his throat as he waited for the door to open, trying to control his facial expression so that he didn't look as though he was so eager he was going to jump Bucky the second the door opened.

Turned out, that wasn't really an option, given Bucky only opened the door partially, lips pressed together so firmly they were bloodless and his hair was hanging in front of his face, eyes trained on the ground.

"Buck, I..." Steve's voice came out shakier than he expected and he stopped to take a breath, and Bucky's head came up, eyebrows pulled together, looking more confused than angry, which made Steve confident to continue. "Buck, I didn't know...That you _didn't_ know," he said simply, because he really didn't know what else to say and Bucky frowned at him, and Steve knew him well enough to know that he was thinking hard. Steve didn't say anything fluffy to try and fill the silence, letting Bucky think before the brunette pushed the door open, in an invitation for Steve to come inside. Anita made a break for the door, the little grey kitten not making it far before Bucky leaned down to pick her up carefully around her belly and carry her back into the apartment. Steve followed after Bucky, closing the door behind him and going through the process of the locks on the door because he knew that it was something that Bucky needed done to feel comfortable in his home, and then slipped out of his shoes.

"Do you want anything to eat or drink?" Bucky asked as they walked into the living room area.

"Uh," Steve paused and now that the idea of food was out there, it made his stomach rumble, and he realized that it had been at least three days since he had had proper food. He and Natasha had eaten properly on the first few days, managing to stop at a few burger bars but then it had been processed smoothies and energy bars since then. "Actually, yeah," he felt kind of guilty, coming all the way here with a plan to apologize to Bucky and try to make up for any misunderstandings and then ask for food. "I mean just an apple or something? That'll be fine until I get back to the bar and put something together."

"You came straight here?" Bucky questioned.

"Well...Yeah," Steve shrugged a shoulder, as though the answer should be obvious. "Wanda text me that her and Peter, I don't know—spoke to you and told you some things that you clearly didn't know, and then I couldn't reach you, and I _had_ to come here. Of course I did, Bucky. I'm glad that I was on the jet back when I got the messages."

"How long's it been since you've eaten?" Bucky was already moving toward the kitchen, putting Anita down on one of the barstools where she watched him from.

"Technically this morning, but that was just a couple of a energy bars..." Steve drifted off at the _glare_ that Bucky was sending his way.

"We can order pizza or something," Bucky stated, changing course completely. "I don't have a lot of food here, but you need to eat—"

"Buck?" Steve stepped forward, staying on the other side of the counter, so he wasn't crowding Bucky's space. "What I want is to talk to _you_. An apple or pear or just—some fruit or something, because I just want to talk. I need to know where you're at, I need to know where we're at, that's more important to me than food." It came out almost breathless at the end and Bucky was staring at him with wide eyes. Even Anita was looking up at him with wide eyes, before she seemed to lose interest in what was happening and she jumped down from the bar stool and padded out of the kitchen area.

"Okay," Bucky mumbled, opening his fridge and grabbing something out before coming back around to the side where Steve was standing, extending his arm. It was an apple, and Steve took it gratefully, turning around to watch Bucky move to sit down on the couch.

Then there was silence.

It was heavy and almost suffocating and Steve didn't want to bite into the apple and fill the room with a loud crunch, so he just stood there with his lips pressed together firmly and tapping his thumb against the curve of the apple. Bucky looked as though he was chewing down on his bottom lip, both hands on his thighs, nervously rubbing up and down. Steve glanced around and instead of sitting down on the couch beside Bucky where he would have preferred to sit, he sat down on the arm chair, putting some space between them and letting out a breath.

"I've had some dealings with HYDRA in the past. I was actually taken by them at one point," Steve admitted slowly and Bucky's head snapped to the side to look over at the blonde. "I, uh—I joined the army when I was nineteen, not when I was in the best condition," he let out a rueful laugh and Bucky just looked confused. "I was skinny and had a lot of health issues and medical bills, and my ma had passed away a few years before then and I had been bouncing around in the foster system and didn't really have many plans on what I was going to do. Sam was actually in the army as well, he'd been in one of the foster homes with me, and he told me about this, well, science experiment where they were looking for people who weren't in peak physical condition." Bucky blinked at him and Steve paused for a moment, because he knew that it could be hard for people to picture him as smaller, weaker, just unhealthy in general, given how he was now. "It wasn't exactly _advertised_ because it wasn't something that the army wanted everyone to know about, and Sam wasn't _super_ keen on me getting into it, but I did, sort of through a friend-of-a-friend, and then, well..." he awkwardly scratched his neck.

"You weren't skinny anymore?" Bucky supplied roughly and Steve let out a short laugh.

"Yeah, I guess so," he answered. "That's one way to look at it." Bucky was looking at him with a frown. "Long story short, there were a lots of—experiments, I guess, and tests and—it wasn't all bad. I had been sick for a long time, pretty much my whole life, so I was kind of used to it all, but I got pretty close with the scientist who was in charge, Doctor Erskine. He was amazing, actually, always said that I reminded him of his nephew who he hardly ever got to see, so I think that's why I was his favourite," he couldn't help the small smile that came to his face when he thought of Abraham Erskine, but it faded quickly as he continued. "There were four of us, in the program, and we didn't really know _much_ about it, other than the fact that the army was looking at making super soldiers." Bucky's eyebrows twitched and Steve didn't miss the way his hands curled into fists. The term was one that Bucky would be familiar with, Steve knew that, it was something that they had in common, which was something that Steve had thought Bucky had always known about them. "It sounds stupid, that we signed up to be experimented on without knowing everything, but all of us had similar stories. Medical bills, no family, no real education and various health issues. The army was offering to cover all of our debts, set us up after this program was finished and potentially _heal_ some of our illnesses. Sounded too good to be true, but..."

"Some of it seems to have worked out," Bucky murmured and Steve nodded.

"Yeah, some of it did. We, uh, we didn't realize that Doctor Erskine was actually ex-HYDRA," Steve said, eyes carefully on Bucky, and Bucky's shoulders tensed as he realized the link to HYDRA. "Not that he did anything to me or the other three in the program, but that was where a lot of his knowledge had come from. When he had shifted his alliances, claimed asylum here in America and agreed to help the army in exchange for immunity for the crimes he had committed while assisting HYDRA, HYDRA still kept their eye on him. They lost track for a while, but when it seemed to become clear that the program was successful, some more noise was made around us, word getting out that the army had a serum that created the perfect super soldier, and that got their attention. It was the first mission that two of the people in the program were taken down by an entire sleeper cell by HYDRA. They were just slaughtered. They stood no chance," Steve's lips were thin as he stared down at the apple in his hands. "The big names, the ones in charge, they got scared and wanted to go to ground for a while, because they didn't want to risk Doctor Erskine's serum getting out. But then...Erskine had been captured going home one evening. I had to go after him. He had been the only father figure I'd ever really had." Bucky shifted at the point, moving until he was sitting on the arm of the chair that Steve was in, and it made Steve relax a little, feeling Bucky so close.

"And the last person in your program? You said there were four?" Bucky prompted gently.

"Riley," Steve mumbled. "Riley was the last one in the program, him and me were the only ones left. And he and Sam actually...Got really close because Sam used to visit me a lot. I convinced him to come with me. I mean—it didn't take much, because he was a good guy, and he really respected Erskine as well, but—I still feel as though it's on me that—" Steve scratched at his neck again and Bucky's eyes felt heavy on the side of his face. "We found the base that Erskine was being held in, but we went in by ourselves, with no back up, we hadn't told anyone where we were going, we were stupid and impulsive and got caught and Riley was killed," his voice came out brittle and Bucky leaned against his side. Steve took in a breath, and then he finally took a bite from his apple. He couldn't taste it, but at least he was doing something other than talking about one of the most painful experiences in his life. He managed to get two mouthfuls of apple down before he stopped, because it just tasted all wrong, and then he just sat there for a moment.

"You know it wasn't your fault, right?" Bucky murmured, hand gently on Steve's arm. "Riley went because he wanted to and because it was the right thing to do, not because you made him."

"Yeah, well—" Steve let out a heavy exhale. "They'd been torturing Doctor Erskine, trying to get the formula for the serum. He wouldn't break, until we got there. It wasn't just me that he had gotten close to, it was all of us. We weren't just an experiment to him, like we were to the higher up names in the government who sanctioned everything, we had all become close, and when they started torturing Riley—" Steve broke off again, but he knew Bucky was smart enough to put together the rest. "The formula they got from Erskine that day, is the one that they used on you," he stated bluntly and Bucky stiffened. "I don't know the details, not with you, because, well—we've never talked about it—"

"You've never asked the SHIELD doctors about me?" Bucky asked with a frown.

"To begin with, yeah, but just the cursory information," Steve shrugged a shoulder. "But then it seemed as though you were going to stay around, and that wasn't my business, and then we started to get to know each other and I...I just thought that it was going to come up. At some point. I kind of thought it would come up sooner, but we haven't been together _that_ long, and I thought you still didn't feel comfortable so I didn't want to bring it up and make you talk about something you weren't ready to talk about..." Steve trailed off and he glanced at Bucky out of the corner of his eye, leaving the ball in his court.

Bucky didn't say anything for a while.

His hand was still on Steve's arm, which Steve counted as a good thing, but the more time that passed, the more nervous he felt. The more _tired_ he felt as well, outweighing his need for food, eyes feeling heavy from how alert he'd needed to be over the past few days and now from the emotional strain of a conversation that he hadn't been expecting, but knew that he'd needed to have.

"I don't remember much from the day that I was rescued—from the day you rescued me," Bucky said quietly. "I had only just come out of cryo...They used to freeze me when they didn't need to experiment on me, something to do with slowing down the process of the serum, because they hadn't quite perfected it. I don't know, but whenever I first came out of it, things were always fuzzy, and that day—that day I had just come out of cryo." His fingers tightened around Steve's bicep. "I don't remember you being there, Steve, and I—I didn't know anything about your history with HYDRA either."

"It's not exactly public record," Steve murmured. "It's not exactly something that is published about in the papers and online."

"I never read much of what was online anyway," Bucky interjected and Steve couldn't help but send him a small, grateful smile and when they went quiet again, the silence didn't feel quite as suffocating as it did before. "Did you...I can order you a pizza or something now, if you want," Bucky offered quietly, and Steve was surprised when it seemed as though the conversation was over.

"No, I think I should probably head home," Steve said quietly. "I'm really tired."

"Stay here," Bucky blurted out, almost before Steve had even finished and there was a sheepish expression on Bucky's face as Steve looked up at him. "I haven't seen you in a while."

"It's only been five days," Steve couldn't help but say, a fond smile on his face as he looked up at Bucky. Bucky just made a little huffing noise under his breath as he stood up and pointed down at the apple.

"You gonna finish that?" He asked and Steve shook his head, because the more he thought about, the more bone-tired he really was. "Come on then," Bucky jerked his head to the side, and Steve would have been embarrassed about nearly tripping over his feet with how quickly he got up, but he was so tired and so relieved that he didn't spare it a second thought. He put the barely eaten apple on the bench and followed Bucky down the hall, Bucky checking the front door and the locks and turning off the light before they went. Anita was curled up in a ball at the end of the bed and she barely lifted her head when Bucky turned on the lamp by the bed so that they could strip down to their briefs and get comfortable.

Steve had never spent the night at Bucky's before, and he knew that this was important.

Especially after the conversation that they had just had.

"Steve?" Bucky murmured into the dark once the light had turned off and they were lying side by side, Steve not wanting to reach out and wrap his arms around Bucky, pull him in to his side like he normally would, because he still didn't want to push any boundaries.

"Yeah?" Steve whispered back.

"Thank you for telling me all that," Bucky replied and Steve nodded, even though Bucky couldn't see him. "I think...I think we still need to talk, about the other stuff and about how you left, but...I don't want to do that now." Steve nodded again, and then cleared his throat, knowing that Bucky deserved a reply.

"Yeah. Yeah, okay," he answered softly. Bucky didn't say anything else, but after a few minutes, he rolled onto his side, so that he was facing Steve, shuffling down in the bed a little bit, so that he could rest his head on Steve's shoulder, and then his breathing evened out, and Steve knew that he was fast asleep.

Steve wasn't surprised when his own eyelids refused to even blink again, and then he was falling asleep with his lips pressed to Bucky's temple.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you made it to the end, please, please, please make sure you leave a comment. They're my lifeblood.
> 
> In our next installment we have some more talking, and then some sexy times.
> 
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**Author's Note:**

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